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Lesson Thirteen: Uses of Utilitarianism

The demon Slubgrip's previous adventures were gathered and recorded in Fr. Longenecker's Lent Book, The Gargoyle Code. Written in Screwtapian style, Slubgrip instructs his protégé Dogwart, while trying to keep tabs on his own 'patient'—all while the tempters tumble through Lent to Easter Day.

Worms, before we begin I must share with you the most amusing event, which occurred over the weekend. You will remember how your amateurish colleague Snort attempted to double cross me—all the time buttering me up while he was making accusations against me to Chancellor Borstal. Happily, I had the chance to butter him up. Literally. I had arranged for the Flancks to take him to the training chambers, but once class was dismissed here I arranged a little meeting with Chancellor Borstal myself.

What poor sniveling Snort didn't realize was that Chancellor Borstal and I go back a long way. Borstal saw that Snort needed something a bit more severe than a few screws and stretches in the training chambers and so he sent him a dinner invitation. As it happened, this was the weekend of the annual dinner for educators and administrators, and Borstal had finagled an invitation. I wasn't, myself, invited to dine, but I have a certain reputation down below for organizing the entertainment at such dinners, and my old friend Crasston, the Undersecretary for Enquiries asked me to fix things as a favor to him. So I arranged for Snort to be my assistant, and gave him the task of melting down the fat from a nice collection of gluttons, so that I could use it to baste the rotisserie of scolds.

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What he didn't know dear worms, was that the melted fat wasn't for basting anything. It was for lambasting him. We made a great ceremony of wheeling out the vat of scalding oil, and as it was the banquet for educators we got Snort all dressed up in a schoolboy's uniform—shorts, tie, and little hat. We told him to stir the vat from a platform on top. Then at an arranged signal, in front of the assembled guests we set off a few little fizz pops and the platform collapsed, dropping Snort into the fat. There was a delightful puff of smoke, and his screams were hilarious. Brought the house down.

Then we scooped him out and he proved to be a nice crunchy treat for the appetizer. Very tasty dipped into a sweet and sour sauce of melted down flatterers. That'll teach him to butter me up!

Now my dear annelids and nematodes, if it isn't too much trouble I really do need you to engage those minuscule organs you call brains. We're still on foundations and philosophy today. Glimwort, be a sport will you my lad, and trot on down to the canteen and bring me a cup of lava? I wouldn't mind a couple of those sweet rolls—you know the ones, made up of layers of flesh from sentimentalists.

We're still thinking about different ways to infiltrate the basic belief of relativism into every aspect of popular culture. Here is a long word for you, slugs: utilitarianism. This is the belief that what works is good. If it is efficient and cost-effective it is good. The hairless bipeds want to bring order out of chaos. They want their world to be clean and efficient and smooth and cost-effective. This sort of neurotic human obsessiveness is something I personally find obnoxious. It's boring, worms. Give me the rough and tumble of chaos. Give me the unexpected and exciting world where anything can happen.

Fr. Dwight Longenecker is the Parish Priest of Our Lady of the Rosary Church in Greenville, South Carolina. His latest book is Catholicism Pure and Simple. Visit his blog and sign up for Faith Works! his free, weekly newsletter on the practical practice of the Catholic faith here.